The present invention relates to improvements in or to systems constituted by an apparatus, particularly for reading and/or writing, and by a removable cassette, particularly containing a memory, for such an apparatus, this apparatus comprising a housing to receive at least partially the cassette and two electrical connector elements provided with a plurality of contacts adapted to cooperate and provided respectively on the apparatus and the cassette.
Such an arrangement is, for example, used for bubble memories produced in the form of removable cassettes, the aforesaid connector elements serving to ensure the electrical connections between the cassette and the reading and/or writing apparatus. However, the presence of such a connector poses numerous problems if it is desired to ensure reliable connections between the cassette and the apparatus, to simplify to the maximum the process of insertion and extraction of the cassette and to avoid at any price the destruction of the contents of the memory.
These problems are due in particular to the relatively large number of contacts which the connector must have to ensure all the necessary connections between the cassette and the apparatus. Considerations of bulk, and of facility of manipulation and the quest for minimum cost lead to discarding special connectors with pins and sockets called nil insertion force. In the same way, the search for better reliability in the connections leads to putting aside connectors with contacts simply in abutment (such as the arrangement of the bubble memory cassette described in European Patent Application No. E-A-0045189, for example) and to rely essentially on connectors with so called pin and socket contacts. However, the large number necessary of such contacts involves considerable frictional forces between the pins and sockets in the course of the phases of connection and disconnection which, if these operations are effected manually, can lead the operator to effect cross movements which cause rapid destruction of the connector.
In addition, safety problems (for example connection or disconnection of certain which become offset over time) can render a manual insertion or extraction of the cassette very delicate, which is not always compatible with the other activities which must besides be ensured by the operator.
There is known for example (U.S. Pat. No. 3,784,954) a mechanical system for plugging in and unplugging two couplable connector elements for printed circuit cards. However this known mechanical system comprises two actuating members independent of one another and situated respectively at the two longitudinal ends of the connector. It is practically impossible for an operator with normal attention, to manipulate these two members with perfect synchronism; it is hence difficult to ensure, under normal conditions of use, that the movable element of the connector should follow a perfectly rectilinear path remaining strictly parallel to the fixed element of the connector. For this reason, it is not possible to ensure that the connection or disconnection of the various contacts will be effected in the desired sequence.
In addition, printed circuit cards equipped with such connectors have only in principle been placed in position or withdrawn under well-defined and few circumstances. The connectors and the associated actuating systems are hence only designed with a view to a restricted number of actuations, which make them quite unsuited for equipping such cassettes, like bubble memory cassettes, which must withstand without damage a very high number of insertions and extractions in a suitable cassette reader.